Page 26 of A Virgin for the Duke of Depravity (Ton’s Beasts #2)

Margaret chose her path through Devishire Mansion carefully the following morning.

She avoided the breakfast room, where she might see Leo again.

She avoided the hall outside her chambers for fear that she would see the girls.

It would break her heart to leave them, knowing that Leo still did not have any idea what to do with them.

She sighed and gave the room another once-over to ensure that she had packed all of her belongings. Theresa had been generous enough to give her the dresses she had borrowed, knowing that she had nothing else to wear to meet her potential husband.

Just as she was shutting and locking the trunk, someone knocked politely on her door. It could not have been Leo, who would have simply let himself into her room without regard for propriety.

“Margaret,” Theresa’s voice called. “Open up. You have been avoiding me all morning.”

The truth was, Margaret had been avoiding Theresa just as much as she had been avoiding Leo. Her friend had been very disapproving of her trip to Olympus yesterday, even if Margaret did not give her all the sordid details.

Being a married woman, Theresa surely had an idea of what they had done in that library without Margaret having to speak it aloud.

With a sigh, Margaret knew she would not be able to avoid their conversation forever. If she were to live here in London, Theresa would be her closest friend, the closest thing to a sister that she had in this world. She could not alienate her simply because she was ashamed.

Margaret opened the door, and Theresa stepped inside. She took in the trunk in the center of the room, shut and locked.

“It seems you have made your choice official,” Theresa said with a frown. She reached out and took Margaret’s hand. “You do not have to do this. We can protect you from whatever he has planned for you.”

“But I have to do this,” Margaret countered. “This is my fate. My father told me to run, to hide myself. I was foolish and reckless, going on one last adventure before I took my vows. I should have known—”

“There was no way you could have known,” Theresa said. She reached out and stroked Margaret’s hair, soothing her. “None of this is your fault. You just wanted to live your life.”

“I should go.” Margaret looked at the trunk and sighed. “Would you do me a favor and call for your carriage? I would not want to use Leo’s. He must be quite cross with me.”

“I imagine that ‘cross’ is not the right word for what he feels.” Theresa frowned, but nodded. “I will go to the stables while you find a servant to carry out your trunk.”

“You have been a dear friend to me,” Margaret said, with tears in her eyes.

She had no idea if this would be the last time she would see her friend. Suppose her new husband did not allow her to make social calls?

“You are my sister, always,” Theresa said with a smile. And then she disappeared out the door to do as Margaret had asked of her.

Margaret looked both ways in the hall to make sure it was clear and walked briskly until she found a footman. After asking him to carry her trunk to the stables, she hurried out the back door.

She would wait in the stables so that she did not have to worry any longer about crossing paths with Leo. What he had done to her the night before was the most pleasant goodbye she could have dreamed of. She would never forget it.

But that was all it was—a goodbye.

As the servants readied Aaron and Theresa’s carriage and loaded her trunk into it, she struggled to resign herself to the life that awaited her. The driver steered the carriage down the drive while Margaret watched from the window.

The buildings and streets blurred past as they rode to the outskirts of London. She looked at the ladies in their finery, bustling around town on errands and to see the dressmaker for the season’s latest fashions.

Soon, she would have a husband of her own, perhaps even a title. Her life could be just as charmed as Theresa’s, she tried to tell herself. A husband chosen by her grandfather might not be the worst thing.

As she had told Leo, the Lord worked in mysterious ways. If this was what He willed for her, she would not fight against it. She would be brave and face the situation she found herself in.

The carriage pulled up to the estate, and she looked at the statues that lined the drive. It felt like another lifetime when she had come up to the door and run her fingers along the cool stone. If she had not shown up here then, would any of this be happening?

She could not say for certain.

The stable hands directed her to the entrance of her grandfather’s estate. A footman walked with her, neither of them speaking. He did not seem to be thrilled about working for the Earl.

Margaret wondered how she would feel, being under his thumb after all these years. She had never truly known her grandfather. In truth, she knew only enough to be frightened of him and what he could do to her as he had done to her mother.

“I will fetch the Earl,” the footman said, leaving her in the front sitting room.

Margaret took the opportunity to scan the room. It was mostly bare, with no bookshelves lining the walls. Unlike Leo and Aaron’s homes, there was no art on the walls. She wondered if the Earl had sold all of it as his fortune dwindled.

She ran her fingers over the dusty tables and tried to take in the estate as a whole. It seemed old and shabby, as if the Earl did not have enough servants to maintain it. She had never seen a home so dusty.

Her training at the convent made her want to get down on her knees and scrub the stone floors until they were clean. She could not fathom living in such squalor.

“Ah, I knew you would come around.” The booming voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

With only a slight hesitation, she turned to face her grandfather. He was positively beaming at her, as if this were a fortuitous situation that they had both found themselves in.

Perhaps it was fortuitous for the Earl. His face was notably brighter, his smile easier than it had been before. Now, he knew he had her pinned right where he wanted her.

His eagerness made her stomach sink as she realized that she was giving him exactly what her mother had deprived him of—obedience.

She should have allowed her friends to protect her as they had promised to do, but there was nothing to be done now. She tried to return her grandfather’s smile, but her efforts came up short.

“I have come to submit to your auction,” she said, seeing that he was waiting for an answer.

“Come, come. The bidders are already here, waiting for you. The auction won’t take place until tonight, but you can meet them now. We want them to see how beautiful you are, yes?”

Her grandfather took a step closer to her and offered her his arm. Margaret desperately did not want to follow him anywhere, and she most definitely did not want to meet the men who would bid for her hand in marriage.

But she was already here. She might as well see what the future held for her.

With a deep sigh, she tucked her hand in the crook of his arm and allowed him to guide her deeper into Riley Manor. They walked past many rooms with closed doors, which she suspected were rooms that had fallen into disrepair, just as the front sitting room had.

Finally, he opened the door to a large ballroom where there were more men milling about than Margaret could have imagined. In a room with so many men, all staring at her as though trying to picture her with no clothes on, she felt small.

She felt the opposite of how she felt when Leo was around.

Her grandfather sensed her hesitation at the threshold and squeezed her hand. “You will be pleasant, and you will make the most of this opportunity. It would be such a shame if something happened to your dear friend’s child.”

“You would not harm the Duke’s wife,” she said, aghast at the outright threat.

He shrugged and gave her a chilling smile. “If not your Duchess friend, then perhaps the nuns you are so fond of. It would certainly be a pity if the convent were to catch fire.”

Margaret bit her tongue. She could stomach him threatening her, though it made ice run through her veins. But she could not tolerate the idea that someone else might suffer because she was unwilling to submit to him.

She would have to go through with this.

Trying to think about the benefits of an arranged marriage, as Theresa and Aaron had shown her through their own experience, she surveyed the men in the room.

The two nearest her were deep in conversation, and they hardly looked up when she entered.

One nodded in their direction, acknowledging them, but nothing more.

But it was not toward these men that her grandfather steered her. Instead, he led her toward a man sitting alone in the corner of the ballroom.

From the way his long legs unfolded beneath him, Margaret could tell that he was tall—and muscular, too. His long black hair fell into his eyes, but it only served to enhance his boyish look.

More alarming was the scar that ran down the left side of his face. Even from a distance, Margaret could tell that something serious had happened to him. Her stomach flipped when she saw his scar, but then she chided herself for thinking the worst.

Her best friend’s husband was also covered in scars, and yet he was not a bad man.

She tried to put on a smile as they approached the man. After all, he could be her future husband. Margaret did not want to make a bad first impression, but her smile felt forced.

“Christopher,” her grandfather greeted jovially. “Look who has just arrived in time for the auction of her hand in marriage.”

Christopher looked her up and down, the smile that once pulled at his mouth fading into a smirk. She felt like a piece of meat at the butcher’s shop. All of these men were examining every inch of her, from her breasts to her round hips.